Where was I ?
Oh yeah, I ran away from my botched job! Needed some time to think about this after chasing a leak, unsuccessfully  for many hours. Not that I did not try hard.
I wrapped my pump in muffling quilts.
[attachment=1,msg2992201]

I made and modified listening devices, that I found out don't help with ultrasonic vacuum frequencies.
[attachment=2,msg2992201]

I turned on the pump and flowed silicone around the perimeter of the film. Still leaking, won't build more vacuum than about 10"hg. I'm looking for 25"hg.
[attachment=3,msg2992201]

Last week, after running every scenario I could think of, over and over in my head, light bulb moment. I had drilled a number of holes into the form, but did not seal the exposed material beneath the formica! I was sucking a steady stream of air right thru the particle board into the holes. Major oversight. I need to fill all the holes with epoxy and re-drill them, plus do through job of sealing the edges. But that will have to wait till I finish this current layup.
I was dying to get home and see if I could bag the whole shebang in 4mil plastic and salvage the work and materials invested so far.
[attachment=4,msg2992201]
Looks like it should work OK. Pulled and held full vacuum. The  plastic is not very stretchy, so bridging can be an issue where the fittings are located, but they are also at the tail end of the infusion path and should not be a factor. I will have some bridging at the resin inlet port/manifold, so I adjusted my usage estimate up. Resin can pool in areas that are bridged and starve other areas of the laminate.

Just about ready to run the new configuration!
[attachment=5,msg2992201]

The yellow tape is the poop.[attachment=6,msg2992201]
Super gooey, sticks like crazy to everything with a little pressure. If it was any softer it would be liquid.
It's all I will use from now on, at least in the cold months.
It's perfect for sealing, thru the bag plumbing.

good to see you back at it Flem

Well I did finally get back to this infusion. And it was not good! More than one fatal flaw. I did not have high hopes for this layup, but the reinforcement was already in place, so it was a loss and a wash not to run it. It was not pretty, but I did get to identify some problem areas and plumbing choices that will be changed for next time.

Definitely never doing this in a LDPE bag again. It impossible to find leaks and this one got bad fast.
[attachment=1,msg2997828]That is a steaming pile of dog poo!
Thats as far as the infusion progressed before the epoxy gelled.

Now I get to dissect it. I will save the dry glass and chop it up. Some of the the other fabrics and tubing is salvageable. Not sure what to do with the big disc of green epoxy. Good thing my time is cheap

Wow what a ride Flem!  I just read this thread from the beginning.  Leak, no-leak, tapes, bags, tubes and flows, what's going to happen, will Flem succeed or will it bust?! I love the experimenting and your bravery in doing so. You're mad I tell you.  But the best people usually are

Keep it up man, I'm psyched to see what comes after that little baby poo splatter you have laying there.  It is a nice color though 

Would have been some wild looking glass!              Thats about 200grms of epoxy.....ouch
[attachment=1,msg2997883]

I figure I might as well share my failures, or success. My ego needs a thrashing now and again

I have the color formula. I will make this work. Might take some more experimenting, but I hope not too much!

You were trying to do to much at one time.

I can see if you had a good bag and used it many times you would have a bow that was lime green and all done.

You are right Max, too many unknowns at once. But I have made quite a few useful observations. I guess I will share some of them, just in case somebody out there with more skills and experience looks at this and says " I can figure this out".
This was my first attempt at a unidirectional reinforced, infused laminate. It's different from a typically reinforced laminate, because with all the fibers running in one direction only, they nestle together very tightly. That and the resin does not travel laterally as well without the cross fibers of normal fabric reinforcements.
The short section that did infuse came in at the thickness I was hoping for, lucky guess based on weight and volume.
It's .063-.071, which is good because I want to be able to sand one side. At that thickness, I calculated the ratio in the range of 65/35-70/30 fiber/resin. It looks real dense, but I sill find it hard to believe.
[attachment=1,msg2998103][attachment=2,msg2998103]
Might have to do a burn test to double check ratio.
Its more translucent than I thought it would be. I used 1% colorant, to total resin weight. Smooth-On recommend 1-3%, so I will double it too 2%.
[attachment=3,msg2998103]
Of course it looks completely different with a solid wood background.

Just incase anybody has insomnia, I though I would share some fascinating facts about particle board. After I discovered I was drawing air thru the holes I had drilled in my form, I needed to seal them up. Which I did with some real thin epoxy and a syringe. Just for fun I calculated the volume of the holes I had drilled into the P.B.   7cc
I mixed up 30cc and used all but 1or2cc  It just kept sucking it up. Stuff is very porous.
That made me curious about how much free air there could be in the form. Most solid wood is recognized to be around 40% air by volume. Considering how porous the P.B. is, I'm thinking more like 60%
Which means my form, by volume contains 230 cubic inches of air. A gallon is 231cuin
[attachment=1]

Well, I re-drilled the epoxy filled holes and did a leak test on the form.   No good, still leaks.
Scraping this form, not spending any more time trying to make it work.
I have a a few sheets of MDF stashed in my shop and some older tooling epoxy that needs to be used, so I thought why not make my own form?
Here it is with the first coat
[attachment=1]

It's showing some fish eyes. The sheet was showing some dirt and stains from age. I should have sanded it more and with 150, not 320, but I did not want to disturb the surface and have it swell up from the epoxy. Turns out it would not have mattered, now I have to sand the epoxy. Fortunately I have enough epoxy for a second coat. I was surprised at how well the epoxy self leveled.
I poured it on the MDF and spread it around with a wennie roller, then swept over it with a heat gun on low.
It also picked up some debris while curing. I used a slow hardener. Second coat will get a 10min hardener and be thinner, so it should set up real fast.
This form is bigger that the last. I made it large enough to be able to lay a sheet of glass on, which will be the new work surface.

This is starting to feel like a journal

If any of you were thinking, maybe I will separate a double pane window, sounds like fun!  It's not
Unless of course you think cutting up a car tire with a utility knife is also fun.
[attachment=1]

But I needed a new tool surface for the form
[attachment=2]

I had to strain the chunks out of the epoxy. Most would have tossed it, not this cheap S.O.B.
Not only am I using chunky epoxy, but I am mixing two different hardeners from other product lines.
Just for fun
[attachment=3]

Quote from: Flem on April 25, 2022, 10:08:00 AM
Unless of course you think cutting up a car tire with a utility knife is also fun.

Thanks for the morning laugh, Flem. I'm enjoying your journal, keep it rolling.


Mark

Thanks Mark, I will. I am confident and determined to succeed

I figured out how to eliminate most of the penetrations that were giving me grief with the formica covered particle board. Not that the MDF is porous, its hard to imagine there is any free air in the stuff.
The new form base will have only 4 holes. And if you were wondering about the pullout strength of MDF, I could not pull this M5  knife thread insert using a crow bar for leverage. No glue
[attachment=1]

Today I am going to do the burn test on my salvaged sample from the last attempt. I'm dying to know the glass volume fraction. The kiln is way too big for this little scrap of composite, but I don't have any other oven capable of 1000+ degrees
[attachment=2]

Flem I dub the the "Macgyver" of the bowyers bench.....

Thats "thee" btw....

OK, I've been waiting...... and waiting..........and waiting

Too find out how this guy makes laminate!! In fact part of the reason I joined up here was to ask some questions.
But the OP of this thread does not accept PM's!!??

Anybody know what the story is??  Hope nothing tragic happened to him

I heard he tripped and fell into that kiln...  Disintegrated...   

Well I'm not going to step into that steaming pile of poo, by making a comment I might regret, but I think if you fell into that kiln you would be cremated!

He is active here:

https://www.traditionalarcherysociety.com/forum/main-campsite

Awesome! Thank you for that info